Is Coruscant the greatest futuristic cityscape, ever depicted on film ?

With Coruscant Lucas continues his trend of planets or worlds with a totally unrealistic mono-terrain.

Hoth - entire planet is ice (geologically nonsensical)
Tatooine - entire planet is desert
Endor - entire moon is forest (geologically nonsensical)
Kamino - entrie planet is ocean
Dagobah - entire planet is swamp (geologically nonsensical)
Coruscant - entire planet is a city (how is oxygen produced, how is the atmosphere maintained?)

in a serious Science-fiction story those worlds would be laughable but since SW is essentially just a fairy tale it doesn't matter I suppose.

Regarding cityscapes - one mistake many people make is that they always assume that future cities have enormously tall buildings. Not only is is it physically (i.e. structurally) ludicrous to expect those buildings to keep standing upright but it's also totally uneconomical (any archtiect will tell you that once your building has more than 50 floors it becomes uneconomical to add further floors. In fact the only reason many American cities build skyscrapers as high as the WTC is for reasons of pride).

What Minority Report got right is that it showed a future city as it is - a mixture of old and modern. Look at a typical city of today. You'll find building that are brand new. You'll find buildings that are 50 years old. You'll find many buildings that are 100 or 200 years old (not in America of course). So it makes perfect sense to assume that in 100 years time there will still be many buildings in our cities that originate from the 20th century and people will still live in them. Or look at cars - SF films often make the mistake of assuming that in the future everybody will have the same type of car, always the latest model and all cars are alike (even Minority Report gets that wrong). Look around you - some people drive big cars, other drive small cars. Some people have expensive luxury cars, others have cheap cars. Some cars you see are brand new, others are 20 years old. The design ranges from goofy to slick, from practical to luxurious. Yet somehow in the future we all drive exactly the same car?

OK, so to answer this. Minority Report is the most interesting future city and The Fifth Element the best designed fantasy city

 

True, but SF has never been considered a true SF film except by the incredibly ignorant. I did like the look of Minority Report, because it was believable. Coruscant basically looked to me like what a live action Jetsons would look like.

Actually in my opinion one of the best futuristic cityscapes in film would be the fly over of Arrakkeen in Children of Dune.

Of course I would expect no one to even mention the city in Metropolis (the original, or even the more recent anime).

 

Is Coruscant the greatest futuristic cityscape, ever depicted on film ?

It is for me.

 

With Coruscant Lucas continues his trend of planets or worlds with a totally unrealistic mono-terrain.

Since when is SW suppose to abide by realism? Blasters? Lightsabers? The Force? Come now. Is Coruscant suppose to be the exception?

 

It's been a long time since I saw Blade Runner but I remember it was pretty much your standard sci-fi themed city: dark, rainy, bright neon lights, plenty of people. Another movie guilty of that is Judge Dredd

Standard? It only seems that way in retrospect when in fact it was Blade Runner that gave rise to that look.

I would have to go with Fifth Element as well. I remember seeing that and being wowed by its FX. It made me really excited for SW which would be 2 years away. The thing I liked about Fifth Element's NYC was that it looked live in. For the most part all we see in Coruscant are wide establishing shots. And when we do see more detail in AOTC it's a chase scene at night, so it makes it very hard to see the details in the city.

 

The thing I like about Coruscant rather than any other rendition of a city of the future is that the city is not a way of visually explaining how screwed up, bizzaro, cold, doom and gloom the future will be. There's a classical feel to Coruscant despite the fact that it would be in the future of earth's present state of evolution. There's a richness, and a sense of culture, even in the underbelly district that we see during the chase scene.

 

Coruscant from Star Wars is my favorite. It certainly shows the population overload well. It also depicts many more different areas than most future cities do. The enormous size of the skyscrapers really makes for great depth and age. The city just kept building up until it covered the entire planet.

Blade Runners Los Angeles is a close second. I loved the pyramid structures. It was very artsy. It's very much like Coruscant and in some ways better in certain spots. Like architecture and such. Dreary and dark also.

Minority Report had a nice city. The cars were a bit ungly, but it certainly explored the functions of certain technologies. Plus it kept parks and trees.

Fifth Elements New York was good. It certainly explored the cultures well. It never skipped on details.

Judge Dredds New York was a bit dreary also. It even showed the Statue of Libery dwarfed by buildings.

A.I. had an interesting looking metropolis. The bridges to the city were excellent examples of futuristic architecture. Very neon too.

 

Although I thought Coruscant was a bit cliche in design I still thought it was a excellent work of art for the ILM designers.

The buildings looked very much the same to me but the interweaving traffic lanes were a neat backdrop.

I liked the idea of different districts including Sidious' lair, the diner street, Jedi Temple and Senate chamber region, and the large power part (with power couplings, flaming pipes etc).

<[-]> Saber

 

Technically, Coruscant isn't a future cityscape since it happened "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away."

(sorry, couldn't resist)

 

Everyone is also omitting the city in Robocop, (which by all respects is Judge Dredd by a different name).

A lot of folks really need to watch a lot more movies.

I couldn't resist that. Even though it's true and obvious.

 

Corusant is just beautiful to look at. Here take a look.

[image=http://www.theforce.net/multimedia/archive/Images/Episode_2/Locations/Coruscant/aotc-coruscant.jpg/image.gif]

 

I have finaly posted a picture on these boards. I've been trying to figure it out for 6 months. Finaly I've got it.

 

Congrats.

 

Well done That is a stunning picture, by the way ! I really love that establishing shot.

 

Nothing beats Blade Runner and Gattaca.

 

Coruscant all the way!